stuck.at.seven is a series of short stories where
the author recounts embarrassing situations from his life.

Appraisal:

I’ve
reviewed a few humor books previously, with mixed success. To re-use a phrase,
humor is a personal perspective. What makes one person laugh, doesn’t raise a
chuckle with another. Unfortunately with stuck.at.seven
I fell into the latter segment.

I actually
found the tale to be quite sad. The author recounts problems in childhood and
in particular at school and attempts to turn them into a joke through the
recounting. It didn’t quite work for me, they still came over as gloomy.
Perhaps it was an attempt at some constructive therapy?

stuck.at.seven is well written, McCombs puts his
situation over well. I liked him (even though he felt a bit damaged) meaning he
connected with me. The early chapters are largely the author discussing
embarrassing sexual situations he got himself into with porn or swearing. For
me the best section is when McCombs moves to Australia (having been previously
unfulfilled in education, work and location). The book becomes more
autobiographical and, rather than turning everything into a joke, shifts to
being more lighthearted.

Again I
stress that some people will find this very funny (there is a section on
Australian phrases that don’t translate well in American, as we Brits use
pretty much all of them I couldn’t laugh much, others may differ). Humor is
subjective.

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